Council & Police offer assurance of pupils safety

Police Scotland

Published:16:16Thursday 10 December 2015

Share this article

Leading education figures from local authorities across the north east of Scotland are reassuring parents that work is taking place to keep young people and staff safe in light of recent incidents involving weapons in schools.

Directors of Education at Moray and Aberdeenshire Council have been working in partnership with Police Scotland and have written to all parents to highlight their commitment to work collectively to reduce these incidents.

Aberdeenshire Council’s Director of Education and Children’s Services Maria Walker said: “Our aim is to work with partners and parents to ensure we all keep our young people, as well as our staff, as safe as possible.

“It is in all of our interests to keep people safe from harm and education authorities will continue to review current practices and procedures to ensure our combined actions help to reduce incidents.

“Extensive work has taken place across the area to roll out anti-bullying measures and we also work closely with Police Scotland on campaigns to tackle anti-social behaviour and mitigate offensive actions.

“We have around 38,000 pupils in Aberdeenshire and the majority of our pupils are well-behaved. These incidents are rare and please be assured that when they do occur, action is taken to deal with them swiftly and appropriately.”

Chief Superintendent Campbell Thomson, the Divisional Commander for Aberdeenshire and Moray, said: “I can confirm we have very recently been called to six incidents within secondary schools where knives have been recovered and seven secondary school pupils have been reported.

“Thankfully no one has been injured and all incidents were brought to our attention by school staff.”